Hey guys, So i sold my new videocard cause i don't like how slow it is and gotten a used GTX 680 instead. I don't mind that it's old, but it's quiet alot faster and i can live with 2gb vram cause i mostly play WoW anyway. Now to the point, my PSU is quiet capable of running bigger card as it can use the full 430W on 12v rails. (EVGA 430W) But sadly has just a single 6+2pin PCIE connector, and the guy who sold me the 680 is shipping a 2x molex > 6pin along with it. I want to make it clean looking inside my case, so i'd like to use a sleeved PCIE extension cable hooked up to the adapter so it looks clean. Is this safe to do?
From what I can see the EVGA 430W is a single 12v rail design, delivering up to 34 amps/408 watts. Nvidia rates 680 at 195 watts. Nvidia lists the minimum PSU as 550 watts. Based on your system, EVGA recommends 550-700 watt PSU. The good news is that you don't have to worry about what rail the molex connectors you're planning to use are connected to. I ran 2 8800 GS's in SLI off an Antec TP430, and it worked fine even though it was less than the recommended PSU. Provided you don't have an unusual amount of spindle drives and fans, I suspect it will work, but you'll be cutting it close. A PSU's output can fade over time, and I think this is part of the reason Nvidia recommends bigger PSU. I've seen 3 bad EVGA PSU's in the past year, 1 600B, and 2 SuperNOVA 1200's, so I don't have the most faith in them. I think the extension cables should be fine, but you're adding more points of failure(the connectors on each end of the extension cable) and you're already cutting it close by using EVGA's smallest PSU. The bottom line is that I think it will work fine and I would probably try it, BUT it might not work reliably and I can't recommend it to other people. Good luck!
430w in itself isn't really an issue. EVGA 430W is basically a barebones PSU, not going to blow up any PC but it's certainly not a quality PSU. His platform without gpu will only use 80w max under load. Adding system fans, hard drives etc should account for 50 watts or so. Should be OK power wise, but it's not a PSU I would recommend. Nothing wrong with an adapter either, just make sure it's at least 18ga wiring.
I believe we are well aware of it being a budget PSU, that was never in question. The assessment is that it's not a high quality PSU, which is a fact. Poor efficiency, average ripple and voltage stability. What is quality about that? Of course it's cheap so that's the tradeoff.
PSU is bought brand new, i will of course change it out soon. My budget was waay to tight and this was the best PSU i could get for 35 euro's not to mention with shipping costs included. I only have the 1TB drive in my signature and the case has only 2 fans and 2 LED strips. It has a third one in the bottom inside the PSU cover but it died after few days owning the case. Damn shop wouldn't take it back and only compensated me. Thanks for the replies anyways, i will install the 680 tomorrow.
It will be fine for a while. Just wait for a good deal on a PSU in the 550-650 watt range if you plan on keeping it for a long time.
No not for long, i'm already thinking about reselling it next month for a 780 Ti. Wich i should have gotten the first time, they're very cheap used. 40 euro difference is worth it imo. Yes my CPU will be an issue probably, but that one gets replaced too, soon i hope. I've already checked how much power it will use, even then 430W is enough. As someone else stated, my CPU uses almost next to nothing with it's very low TDP. So far 680 runs like a beast, no bottleneck zero nada, every game i tried uses 99% of the card. Mass effect Andromeda is the only one that has a few hiccups here and there but that game isn't that optimized and favors more cores. But i'm happy that it runs at 50-60fps most of the time with stunning visuals for a card this old is amazing. I always prefer older and flagship cards over current gen cheap cards like the RX 460. I'm not kidding, some games have gotten double the framerate, PUBG i can run at 50-60fps with medium settings. With the RX 460 i had to set everything to very low AND lower the resolution scale and still it couldn't get up to 50fps. :bang: Sorry for this wall of text, but i'm so happy i got rid of that card, it's so not worth the price tag. True it's always a gamble buying used card, you'll never know how much stress they've put on it. Personally i've never encountered issues with used PC parts except for a powersupply wich was actually brand new and a very expensive one i might add. But that was probably my own fault, it was powering 2x GTX 580's and a OC'd i7 860. It blew up on me, only the graphic cards survived ha ha ha. :') I could go on on lol. :nerd:
